Controlling Uncertainty in Product Development

by Guy M. Merritt, Preston G. Smith

Proactive Risk Management offers product development teams a plan with which they can enhance their management of project risks by identifying risks early and managing them to diminish disruption throughout the project. Using a practical, easy-to-use, fact-based approach, it will help developers manage all the risks associated with a project. Although this process is tailored to commercial product development, it is applicable to many other types of projects with some adaptation.

Avoiding the Blunders and Traps That Lead to Debacles

by Paul C. Nutt

For more than 20 years, Ohio State University Professor Paul C. Nutt has studied how decisions are made and has written extensively about what works, what doesn’t and why. His key finding in all this work is startling: Decisions fail half of the time. Organizations spend vast sums of money and commit significant amounts of resources without realizing any benefits. Nutt writes that failures can be traced to three blunders and seven traps that ensnare decision makers; avoiding these blunders and t

Real-Life Stories of How People Change Their Organizations

by John P. Kotter, Dan S. Cohen

While most companies believe change happens by making people think differently, that isn’t the case. Instead, according to John Kotter and Dan Cohen, change happens when you make people feel differently. You have to appeal more to the heart than the mind. The authors offer a new dynamic — the “see-feel-change” dynamic that fuels action by showing people potent reasons for change that spark their emotions. Built around the eight steps of change first introduced in Kotter’s bestseller...

What It Takes to Keep Your Company on the Cutting Edge

by Gerard H. Gaynor

While many equate innovation with a creative drive found in the best and brightest employees, true innovation is much more than that — it is an organization-wide commitment to openness and communication. It requires a culture that values original thought and that supports new and valuable ideas with principles, policies and appropriate infrastructure, across the entire company. In Innovation by Design, Gerard Gaynor provides sound, practical advice and real-world examples (culled from 4

Strategies and Practices for Turning Conflict to Synergy in Organizations

by James W. Gibson, Kirk Blackard

Do you want to optimize performance? If you do, you must first find a way to create an environment that minimizes workplace conflict and integrates resolution strategies into management systems. Only by preventing or minimizing, bringing to the surface, and resolving conflict can you unleash the full power of the organization. Capitalizing on Conflict shows readers how a company can create a comprehensive, organization-wide effort to resolve specific conflict events with proven strategi

How Next Generation Companies Are Achieving Peak Performance and Profitability

by Tom Sommerlatte, Ronald S. Jonash

Investors reward and pay a premium for innovation. The authors present a framework for capturing this ‘innovation premium’ based on five areas: strategy, process, innovation resources, organizational structures, and innovative learning cultures.